Dull Stars and Just Being
by Penny Wishes
Summary: She got the Brains and him the courage and I the glue, I was supposed to hold us together, yet I seemed to be better at tearing us apart, especially since falling in love with Hermione...
1. Dull

Summary: The brains went to her, the courage to him, and the last bit, the glue that was my job, only problem is I seem to tear us apart more then keep us together... Ron realizes his feelings for Hermione and reflects on not feeling good enough for her and his fear it will tear the trio apart.   
  
Rating: PG-13 for mild swearing  
  
A/N: Ok the text is a little over the top, I mean I kind of over did my metaphors etc. and I know Ron's not generally portrayed as articulate, but he's seventeen now, and yeah, things can change... mainly I just felt like writing over the top stuff... lol..  
  
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.  
  
~*~  
  
Dull Stars and Just Being  
  
How do I possibly justify the change I brought about, I'll be frank, I don't. Let's be realistic, something that has been thrust upon me, realism, there is no way I CAN justify it. I screwed up our perfect circle, unbeknownst to the others and now I can sit knee high in my own poignant shit, in a manner of speaking.   
  
It got cold, scary; the sun only shines when the clouds don't over take it, and when they do, what is one to do but stop shining. Not saying I ever shined. I was the dull one, dullness being my exact appeal. When there are two of unreachable status there has to be one in exact opposition to even it out. To make perfect real, and real amazing.   
  
The brains went to her, and courage to him, and the last bit, the glue that was my job. Funny how glue in it's own can both keep something together and effectively make a mess of things all at once. I didn't need anyone to tell me I was the glue, I may not be the brains, but that was something I figured out on my own.   
  
There is an obvious problem to this affect and I don't have to tell you what it is, I find it quite obvious and anyone of minimal intelligence I'm sure has figured it out: I do more fighting than peace making. So I have a bad temper at times, hot headed, or antagonistic, whatever you want to call it, I ended up on the fighting end more often then the peace-making end. Not only was I not good at keeping us together, I seemed to have a good affect at pulling us apart. In essence the two lights had to do the job of the dull therefore straining their lights to the point of "burning out"   
  
  
  
He got quiet and angry. Dark brooding Harry, wanting escape and yet knowing that doing so would be not only his, but all his loved one's death's.   
  
She on the other hand, learned to need. As Harry alienated himself for his own artificial benefit, she grasped for him. It was hard to see a strong girl, no, Woman, change from frighteningly total competence, to a weakness not only in physical aspect, but in mental and emotional aspect. It was Harry she leaned toward why shouldn't she lean toward him, he being a light like herself? What attracts a firefly? That of it's own making, light clings to light as dark suffocates in dark.  
  
Only after his light was clouded did she find her way to me, not nearly as bright as Harry, but not as suffocating as night, best described as dull.   
  
As a child I used to fool myself into thinking that one's light could strengthen through growth. Maybe I wasn't the smartest or the bravest or the best looking, maybe I sputtered and stumbled through speech instead of articulation, maybe I wore the same pair of trousers several times before washing them, maybe I even occasionally chewed with my mouth open but maybe someone would see SOMETHING in me and through them a light would grow. As a child Charlie told me that when people died they turned into stars and those that were the kindest, smartest, bravest, they would be the brightest stars and those evil, ignorant, and rude would diminish into the fabric of the sky creating the desolate darkness of night and when night ended the dark people would fall into emptiness and all the stars would gather together and paint the colors of sunrise.   
  
How bright would my star be?   
  
Would I even GET a star?   
  
Maybe death would take one look at me and find me not important enough to even have a star and instead I would turn into a night cloud, not the white cotton-candy-esque cloud, the gray mist that is only visible if you squint, and maybe when the stars would gather together to make our sunrise I would be sucked away with the evil so as not to ruin the beautiful sunrise.   
  
She would be the brightest of stars, an angel amongst the sky.   
  
She came to me after yet another tragedy and after yet another ignorance from dear Harry.   
  
"I don't know how much more of this I can even take," she had whispered wrapping her arms around her knees and sinking deep into the big armchair that I had pushed into the corner for her. I had never more wanted to be a knee.   
  
"You're the strongest person I know, if anyone can handle this, it's you," I replied all sincerity. She blinked several times a sign that tears were at the brink.   
  
"And Harry was just starting to be HARRY again." She sighed, "Did you see his face after Lupin told us what had happened?" I hadn't I had been too busy focused on HER eyes to notice HIS. As she looked up at me then and my eyes once again DID find hers I knew I had ruined us all. I knew that for a long time now I had been denying what I truly felt and that now I simply had to deny it further if I wanted us to stay Harry, Ron and Hermione. But I didn't, not entirely at least.   
  
"I was watching your eyes then, actually," It wasn't obscene or forward, it was simple, understated in it's own deep essence, a naïve skin on the true meaning. Long eyelashes closed the said eye, black crisscrossing lashes, like a fortress keeping my own prying eyes out. They opened again questioning.   
  
  
  
"How embarrassing, I was probably crying," she said purposely ignoring the meaning of my own words.   
  
"Does it embarrass you, crying?"   
  
"It's a weakness, I just can't help it sometimes, it's like I'm still a child."  
  
"You can't be a child though-"   
  
"I know I have to be strong but-"   
  
  
  
"You're too perfect and important... and beautiful to be a child." She tilted her head to one side a small smile slightly imprinted across her lips.   
  
  
  
"Umm, thank you," She seemed surprised as red filled my skin.   
  
  
  
"I-I don't know where that came from," I lied.   
  
  
  
"I can't believe today of all days... I think it's the only time you've ever told me I was-"  
  
"Beautiful." I finished for her she nodded. "Was it bad timing?"   
  
"No... No it's good timing, really good." She stood up and collapsed against me in a hug, after a few seconds her body started shuttering against mine and I knew she was crying.   
  
"I'm sorry, I really, really am," She cried softly into his shirt.   
  
"Don't be, you deserve to cry," I whispered into her hair, and then she looked up.   
  
"And what about you Ron?" Her voice was so little, so meek, a tone so different from the authoritive or mothering voice she took with anyone else.   
  
"What about me?" I felt sick but in a good way, to ask you have to care right? For a star to care, the star must at least see some sort of light, right?   
  
"When are you going to be aloud to cry? Of all of us you're the only one I've never seen really just..." She turned the sentence over in her head searching for the right word, "You never let yourself just be, your always controlled," her eyes soft and amber colored, still wet and velvety looking, watching me.   
  
"Well, I mean, I just handle it differently I guess," I muttered knowing that my face is growing progressively red. She blinks and a tear slides down her cheek but her eyes never lose me and I realize, it's not my light she sees it's the light she gives me, the way she makes me feel that gives me light. And I know it's ruined, at least in my head, I can't think of her as just plain old Hermione, she's perfect to me, a goddess. Soon I'll have to leave, I mean, staying will only kill me faster after it's clear that she has nothing but platonic feelings for me, it will happen, and I will leave and the trio will be over. I will ruin something totally perfect totally pure because of my own pathetic love for a girl who's far too perfect, far too good for plain, pathetic, DULL, Ronald Billius Weasley.   
  
"You handle it good, just sometimes I think TOO good, no one's perfect Ron," She whispered pulling away a little and rubbing the tears away from her eyes.   
  
"Coming from someone good at everything," I joked softly, shaking my head, "You don't need to worry about me thinking I'm perfect Hermione, really. I of all people know I'm far from it." I gave her a fake smile but she squinted as if trying to see through the façade.   
  
"Sometimes I disagree," She said pensively, but she didn't verify which part that she disagreed with, the part that she's perfect, or that I'm not. I'm guessing it's the bit about her being perfect; Hermione always underestimates herself, one of her qualities that is so beautiful. "I'm going to go change, I'll see you at dinner," She said softly before standing up on tip-toe and kissing my cheek softly down by my jaw line since that's the only part of my face her lips can reach, even on tip toe, well, except my chin, and lips...   
  
"Ok," I whispered smiling down at her and taking one last deep breath, taking in the scent of her hair, her chap stick, her mint breath. She turned and I watched as she floated gracefully to the stairs leading up to her corridor, she turned and smiled at me just before she disappeared into the stairwell I followed her with my eyes watching every last bit of her before she disappeared the last thing I saw was her tiny little left foot, and my eyes clung to the thin little silver chain linked around it, a small star charm dangled from it.   
  
The anklet I gave her for her sixteenth birthday a year ago. Maybe you don't have to shine the brightest to be remembered. Maybe just being IS enough.   
  
~*~  
  
~*~  
  
Whether you loved it or hated it please review! Believe me the reviews really do help, especially those with honest criticism! So be brutally honest! And check out my other fics if you DID happen to like this one! :-D 


	2. Light

Summary: Ok... I wasn't totally planning on doing a second chapter, but my reviewers (however few, you guys ROCK! And so I dedicate this chapter to all those that reviewed the first) made me want to :-D Not to mention I LOVE LOVE LOVE Ron and yeah I just can never get tired of writing about him.  
  
Rating: PG-13 for mild swearing  
  
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.  
  
~*~  
  
Light: the Second Installment  
  
I did see her at dinner, in a long sleeved white shirt with some muggle logo proclaiming it's individuality across the front of it and black pants with creases down the front. Even in muggle clothing she seemed to blend in with everyone, just enough, although her radiance separated her from the rest, at least for me. She stopped to say "hi" to a few people before finding her way to her normal spot, across the table from me. It amazed me how she could stay so happy around other people, how she could put on such a strong face after what Lupin had just told us today. Maybe that's a gift sent to the bright, one that was being given while I was being forgotten.   
  
It was almost disgusting, dishonorable, Tonks was our friend, no one should be smiling while she was... Gone, when our eyes locked I saw she wasn't though maybe on the surface she was, but inside she was still crying.   
  
"I checked on Harry," She muttered as she sat down. I forced a smile to appear on my own face. He's my best friend, he really is, but he's not for her to take care of, that's not her part. But maybe I'm not good enough at the part of glue, maybe she realizes that and is finally taking over what is too big a responsibility for Ron Weasley.   
  
"How's he doing?" I asked sincerity, true sincerity, I do care, I DO. She sighed softly; and directed her gaze to the empty plate in front of her, but even with her eyes lowered I could see the glisten in them. Why does he do it to her? Doesn't he see the angel whose only goal is to make HIM happy; The Goddess who abandons her throne to look after him; the star who falls from the sky to breath light into him?  
  
"He really scares me sometimes Ron," she whispered, and I hated myself. If I ignored her, hid from her, avoided her as he does, would she cry for me? I think of the anklet and it gives me hope but what is hope? The force that excels the good to great, or the lie that keeps the lowly hanging on, a long painful death...   
  
"Me too," I replied and her eyes blinked back up to mine. She squinted at me again and it made me uncomfortable, am I fraud? Do I REALLY care or was she seeing the malevolent voice that tells me that Harry's only doing this for her attention. I looked away.   
  
A silence over took us for a long time. Eventually I scooped on whatever food was on the table, onto my plate and began mindlessly eating it forcing each ash-like bite down my throat. I felt sick, disgusting. Harry IS my friend, my best friend, my brother and if Hermione likes him better then me then I should let her, if that's what makes her happy... But I couldn't not then, still can't now, come to think of it.   
  
She didn't eat, she just sat there for a long time staring at the table, and then at me, and then at the table. I had a feeling other people near us were watching us too, as usual waiting for the show that would come along with one of our stupid fights, probably started by my pretentious shit.   
  
"Ron," she finally started cautiously in a very soft very high-pitched voice. I took a deep breath and looked up; she was biting her bottom lip.   
  
"What H'mione?" I asked in a voice much softer and lower than I had meant to, almost too quiet to hear. She didn't reply for a long time just stared and took several deep breaths. "Ron, why do you hate Harry?" I imagined her saying, or "Ron, why are you so selfish?" "Ron, why won't you just leave me alone?" "Ron, I hate you." "I hate me too," I'd reply quietly and then what would happen?   
  
But she still wears the anklet. Still.   
  
"Ron, I don't want to lose you too," She finally cried, not a sob, but a really soft cry, so soft that our audience couldn't hear, I could hardly hear... Maybe I was dreaming.   
  
"What?" I asked.   
  
"Harry's lost, and I thought, I thought maybe if I just kept talking to him, maybe... I thought you and I... I thought we, maybe together we could help Harry and then we could be us again, but now..." She stopped and covered her mouth with her hand and I sat there feeling stupid. "Now you... Please don't leave me Ron, PLEASE!" she was crying now loud and I was still just staring at her, me leave HER?   
  
She was up and running away before I could reply. I admit that when I put my hand up to my face, to see if I was really there, if this was real, that my cheeks were wet, I don't know how long I sat there crying. Eventually Neville found me and told me that Hermione wouldn't come out of the girl's dormitory and that if we had, had a fight, could we please make up soon because he had a potions test coming up and needed her help.   
  
I've never been known for my bravery, hell, I've never been known period. And I wasn't brave enough to go talk to her. I wish I was I really wish I was, but I wasn't. I went to the boys dormitory, to my bed, and let myself collapse into it's blankets. She cared. She cared about ME the cloud, the glue, the mistake.   
  
She never ceases to amaze me.   
  
And I hurt her, AGAIN. I made her cry, instead of being the helpful friend I should have been I abandoned her and Harry, HARRY my best friend.   
  
"What's wrong?" his dark voice asked as I laid there like an idiot. It surprised me, he had hardly said two words to me since the news that morning.   
  
"Hermione, she thinks I, WE, are abandoning her," I replied after the initial shock wore off I sat up and opened the curtains around my bed. Harry looked back at me, through half closed eyes.   
  
"I hate myself for it," He whispered and I nodded. We both sat in silence for a long time.   
  
"She was crying... I made her cry..." I sighed and as the last bit of oxygen left my lungs the sigh turned into a sob. I covered my mouth and felt myself shaking. Harry watched me desolately.   
  
"Why does it have to be US, Ron?" He finally asked after I had calmed down. "This is the," he paused as he calculated, "Ninth person in the past two years... Tenth in the last three." He whispered and his voice started shaking too.   
  
"I can't go to another funeral," I agreed putting my head in my hands.   
  
"She doesn't deserve it though," He said after a long time. And I sat up and looked at him. I nodded and wiped my eyes.   
  
"Losing you is really hard for her," I replied softly.   
  
"Losing me is sad, but Ron even mothering me, she always talked about you, you're her light."   
  
Harry, my best friend.   
  
~*~   
  
Man this is like even cornier the first bit... oh well, it makes for a semi-happy ending. Reviewers will be worshiped..... 


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